Eye Opener

🙋🏽Hands up if you are someone who appreciates online shopping? Maybe it's because of being able to do it from the comfort of your own home (or work chair...🙈)... because you don't have the time to "window shop" and need to click and forget about it (mamas, can I get an AMEN?!) or it may even be a small form of escape and "therapy" for you.

Whatever the reasoning, the trend has been on a steady and continual increase over the past 10 years to the point that in 2007 online sales surpassed that of retail sales. Since then, that number has steadily rose and continues.

This brings me to a story. A well-known, very wealthy (from a TSX standpoint) online store totally failed me a few months ago. I've decided to write a little blog post about it as a way to bring light to ensuring we here at We Felt That keep "the experience" and every touch point a priority.

This un-named store had a beautiful, modern and lovely website. I was quick to find the item I was looking for, and happy to see it was in stock and ready to ship. The ordering process was quick, and before I knew it, I was tapping the "buy button" and waited for my item to arrive.📬

Lo and behold it did... barely... Allow me to explain.

The envelope it came in was a mess. It came looking like it was packaged 📦 by a hasty employee at the end of their shift... on their last day... and on the way to the post office thought they would make a point of making sure the object inside knew they were not happy.

The first thing on my mind was... OH NO! I really hope it's not damaged. Second thing was: "I can't believe this company did such a poor job at missing a HUGE opportunity to provide better value in their total buying experience".

Their website is easily a 9.5/10. Their products are trendy, modern and sought after. But they totally dropped the ball from that point on.

That was a really big "ah-ha" moment for me. I began to reflect on what our shop was going to impress upon people. Until now, I was wrapping our items in a little white tissue, and putting them in a plain white envelope and popping it in the mail. It was then that I learned the importance of consistency and branding in the WHOLE experience. Not just in photographs, online, etc....

I wanted to "wow" and honour our customers, who are ultimately the driving force of our shop. I wanted to provide value. I wanted referrals because of their own experiences. I wanted to support other small shop and business owners who specialize in "extra touches" for creating a terrific and lasting first impression. I wanted to create an experience.

I learned a lot from this company's cruddy "whole" experience.

I am thankful that my own online store sees people from all over this beautiful globe, and we strive to give our customers an online shopping experience that is efficient, full of variety, and secure. We use the sale platform SHOPIFY and have had terrific results from the very beginning. Their customer service is second to none. You get a real, live "guru" on the other end who knows the ins and outs of the shops, server and can help trouble shoot any issues that arise.

ps. If you are curious to know what was inside of the plain, shaggy, and terribly packaged envelope... it's the 'famous wooden hand' that is in many of the photographs of our bracelets. I needed a prop that would give a consistent look of dimension and reliability to our customers... and it arrived looking like it went though world war 3! A little bit of sand paper got it looking good again... but ya. Talk about a terrific lesson learned for the land of ecommerce!